Our weekly roundup of the quirky, profound, and unexpected things we heard on the Lopate Show this week.

“A lot of them take heroin, smoke opium and weed –during fire fights.” – Journalist Ben Anderson on the insurgents in Afghanistan’s Helmand Province.

The core of many of the textbooks used in New York is determined by the Texas State Board of Education.

Rodney King on the Trayvon Martin shooting: “It’s easy to kill a black man, a black kid also, these days and get away with it because it's been going on so long. He deserves justice. ... His family deserves justice."

Is lobbying a good idea run amok?

There is a “smoking gun” document that helps prove the true origins of the word “Supercalifragilisticexpialodocious.”